Sonic Generations Modding Highlights – Level Mods

Sonic Generations released on PC in 2011 and since its launch, a lot of great fan mods have been produced. They can range from texture mods or character swaps (like say making Shadow or Metal Sonic playable) but the most impressive and interesting ones are the level mods.

Today I want to highlight some level mods from Sonic Generations that I highly recommend you check out and considering this year is the Blue Blur’s anniversary, why not consider giving Generations another run with a few of the mods below!

Sonic Generations has a lot of mods now but one of the first level mods that was released was a Modern take on the Shadow the Hedgehog zone ‘Sky Troops’. This zone focuses on running across floating ruins and it was one of the better stages from Shadow.

The version you see in the video above takes some elements from the original zone but adds some changes to make it fit nicely within the Modern Formula Sonic uses in Generations. It is a bit simple compared to other zone mods I will be talking about soon but it is a very impressive stage mod.

Music of the stage can be found below and it was produced by EXshad & Zach Hinchy.

Sonic Generations 3D controls while not 1-to-1 like how the Blue Blur controls in earlier 3D games, have some grounding within that frame work. So once Generations landed on PC, it was only a matter of time before iconic Sonic Adventure and Adventure 2 levels found home inside Generations. This is where CorvidDude comes in to the picture, as he produced three level mods under the branding Sonic Adventure Generations.

This series of level mods offers three massive zones based on iconic locations from Sonic Adventure; Emerald Coast, Mystic Ruins and Windy Valley. I will be leaving videos for all three levels below but they are very impressive takes on the original zones. Wide and full of short cuts to take. This mod even changes Sonic a bit, with his boost taking more of the boost meter, so you are pushed into being more careful with your running & jumping.

Hang Castle Mod – by TailsMilesPrower888

Sonic is known for the green hills and blue skies but he has a number of other iconic level tropes that he dashed across over the years. One being the mystic or haunted locations. Classic Sonic did explore some of these like in Sonic 2’s Mystic Cave or Sonic 3&K’s Sandopolis. But Sonic during the Dreamcast era explore this trope three times, with my favorite take on this being Heroes version of the haunted tropes.

Hang Castle is a level from Heroes that has Sonic rolling around with is buddies Tails and Knuckles going upside down and exploring a odd castle. In Generations, this level is massive, with this level mod offering new paths not scene in the original version found in Heroes and uses the original games gimmicks this level provides to great effect.

You know how people say ‘Oh, the Modern Sonic games feel like racing games sometimes!’ and you just roll your eyes a bit…..they aren’t that far off in this specific case. Sonic runs across four different versions of the iconic Rainbow Road course that has appeared in the Mario Kart series over the years.

Modern Sonic’s control and how his core gameplay systems work fits really well with the level design offered in this mod and its a lot of fun running like mad across the rainbow road.

His goal is to port the entirely of Sonic 06 into Sonic Generations and currently has a number of zones across Sonic’s run through 06 inside Generations. The most recent example was the one I shared above, which shows of Tropical Jungle. This one really impressed me, as it offers not just the main path Sonic blazes across but the paths Silver and Rouge take in the original game.

It gives a lot of replay value to this specific level and this applies to other zones as well. For example, take a look at Dusty Desert below. It does a very similar thing, where when you get to the goal ring, you have two springs that take you to different level paths. If you want to learn more about the mod yourself, feel free to visit brianuuuSonic Reborn‘s YouTube Channel.

You might be rolling your eyes seeing this and think ‘Oh, just a Green Hill zone texture pack or something’. But that is far from the truth. SonicBoom5 spent a lot of time working on this level mod and it is a completely original zone, just using the Green Hill Zone template to mimic Sonic 4’s Splash Hill Zone.

This level is open with tons of varying paths you can take and it’s open nature offers a ton of replay value upon repeated playthrough’s. The music remix that accompany this level is also really well done, as it makes the theme of Splash Hill sound really nice.

Remember Sonic Unleashed? That Sonic game that introduced the Modern template into the Sonic series? Well, many loved its day levels but they had a few issues on consoles. Mainly frame rate issues in some zones (Cough Jungle Joyride & Eggmanland Cough) and that detracted from how fun they can feel. So Dario ff / samothethiefalongside other members of the Sonic Modding Community teamed up to create a collection. This collection contains the main acts across Sonic Unleashed’s day levels and porting them inside Generations.

What does this offer? A lot honestly; better controls thanks to Generations refinements over Unleashed, higher frame rate, and support for the many character/skin mods on PC. It is a fantastic mod that makes some of the best 3D Sonic levels, even better.

The best part? This mod is not over yet. Unleashed Project is still on going with new team members and they are hard at work porting over the different mission acts from Unleashed alongside some of games DLC levels into Generations.

Lets close this little romp across the modded era with some Classic Sonic-themed gameplay. Classic Sonic feels ‘different’ compared to how he controls in the Genesis games and this means not many people make level mods for Classic.

But JansenMthought otherwise; he created a faithful level mod that explore the Mystic Cave Zone from Sonic 2 and its a really great looking level. He made the needed adjustments to make it work for this interpretation of Classic Sonic and it is a very fun level.

I hope you all enjoyed my tour across the modding community Generations offers and I am only scratching the surface here. Many, many level mods for Generations are out there but I wanted to highlight these specific level mods as I felt they are some of the ones I enjoyed looking into.

Of course, you need the PC version of Generations to play these mods and I offered links across the article to the different creators of the mods, so feel free to check them out if you are interested!